Skip to content
Open menu Close menu

Feed your appetite for cooking with Penguin’s expert authors

penguin logo

Alfredo Pasta with Sweet Peas

This easy midweek pasta recipe boasts a creamy Alfredo sauce with plenty of lemon zest and crisp spring peas.

From the book

Introduction

When I was a kid, I was unwaveringly certain that fettuccine Alfredo was the most glamorous dish on earth and if that didn’t give it away, yes, I grew up in the 1980s. Alfredo was on every menu before the low-fat craze eradicated its lushness, as eighties as walnut oil, raspberry vinegar, and me having a very unfortunate set of bangs.

Obviously, given the chance to talk about pasta for a few pages, I had to drag it back here for its renewal (but hopefully not its farewell tour). However, there are a couple things that make this dish espe­cially difficult to construct as an adult, both pertaining to things I didn’t know then that I am not sure I am glad I know now. The first is that the thick, creamy Alfredo sauce is as authentically Italian as, well, pizza seasoning blends. The second is that it’s much harder as an adult with nagging concerns about arteries and double chins to mindlessly delight in an unapologetic puddle of butter, cream, cheese, and refined flours the way I did as a kid.

But I think if you’re going to do something, you should do it right, and if I wanted to find some crystalline sliver of my childhood in a rich bowl of pasta, I was going to have to do it properly – that is, immoderately. And I almost pulled it off, but the week I was tinker­ing with this recipe, I managed to run the little Italian store down the street out of the tiny pasta shells I like best for this dish, leav­ing only the dreaded wholemeal ones behind. Then, the market by my apartment had fresh shelling peas, and once they landed in the dish, and nested themselves in those little shells, I was too charmed to consider making it without them again. My inner thirteen-year­ old might understandably be appalled that I ‘grown-upped’ this with icky fresh vegetables and whole grains, but my outer adult thinks that the sweet, crunchy peas offset the richness perfectly, the heartier pasta is an excellent stage for all the sauce, and that, quite often, pasta dishes (and tastes in bangs, thank goodness) are improved with age.

Read more Read less

Method

Bring a large pot of salted water to boil. Add the pasta, and cook accord­ ing to package instructions. Add peas to cook during the last 30 seconds of pasta cooking time. Reserve 120ml pasta cooking water, and set aside. Drain the pasta and the peas together.

Dry out the pasta pot, and pour in the cream. Bring the cream to a simmer, and cook it until slightly reduced, about 4 minutes, stirring frequently. Add the butter, and stir it until it has melted. Generously season the sauce with freshly ground black pepper; add a pinch of salt as well as the lemon zest. Add 90g of the Parmesan, and stir it until the sauce is smooth; then toss in the drained pasta and peas. Cook the pasta in sauce for 2 minutes, until the sauce has slightly thickened. Add the reserved pasta water by the spoonful if needed to loosen the sauce.

Divide the pasta among bowls. Garnish with remaining Parmesan and the flat-leaf parsley.

Reviews

Have you tried this recipe? Let us know how it went by leaving a comment below.

Please note: Moderation is enabled and may delay your comment being posted. There is no need to resubmit your comment. By posting a comment you are agreeing to the website Terms of Use.

There are no comments yet

Be the first to leave a review

newsletter

Subscribe to The Happy Foodie email newsletter

Get our latest recipes, features, book news and ebook deals straight to your inbox every week

From the book: The Smitten Kitchen Cookbook

Close menu